Developing an innovative culture in Argentinean SME

Innovation has become a game changer in the competitive and social arenas, capable of boosting and maintaining the highest competitive levels. In this sense, the innovative business culture -a particular intangible asset- is shown as a sufficient condition to develop difficult-to-imitate and sustainable competitive advantages, and a key challenge that companies’ executives have today. In addition, SME are scattered all over the planet and represent a fundamental driver for economic growth and social development, especially in Argentina. The hypothesis of this work –which was corroborated- is that if an adequate innovative business culture is developed, it is feasible to promote an innovative performance improvement. As a result, one of the main findings of this study –a follow on of some previous ones- is that an innovative culture provides identity, generates commitment and facilitates control, stimulating innovative performance and proposing competitive advantages. Specifically, the studied Argentinean SME environment has shown some difficulty in order to exploit novel ideas and promote this kind of culture. It has been verified that the managerial role could be improved as it was limited due to different inhibitors that are pointed out in this work, and that novel avenues should be found to benefit more people of our society. The study is exploratory-descriptive, with a qualitative methodology. It is supported with a bibliographical and an empirical analysis